Rep. Garcia’s push for Cuba drug trial tests support for embargo

In a significant break with Cuban exile leaders, Miami Congressman Joe
Garcia is supporting the efforts of a Havana research institute that
wants U.S. approval to test and market a diabetes treatment in this country.

Garcia’s endorsement marks the first time a Cuban-American in Congress
has overtly backed a measure that, in the eyes of critics, undermines
the embargo and could eventually give the Castro government access to
U.S. markets without making democratic reforms.

The move splits the Cuban-American congressional delegation for the
first time, could become a campaign issue in the Democrat’s reelection
campaign and, more broadly, indicates a shift in Miami politics as the
exile community’s power appears to wane amid new waves of immigrants.

Garcia said his decision was not political, but was intended to help
people who suffer from diabetic foot ulcers.

“This is about something that can maybe save lives. This is about
medicine,” Garcia said. “There are 70,000 amputations that happen yearly
from diabetes. I’m not going to be the guy who decides that people will
suffer because of the embargo.”

But the political significance is tough for experts to ignore.

“This is a ‘wow’ situation. Nothing like this has ever happened,” said
Mauricio Font, a Latin America studies expert at the City University of
New York. “In the past, this position would essentially be considered
collaborating with the Castro regime.

“But today, my guess is that things are starting to change,” Font said.
“Many Cubans in the United States would not be shocked, had come here
long after Castro came to power, and wouldn’t be opposed to something
like this.”

Behind the effort is a longtime ally of Garcia’s: former Massachusetts
U.S. Rep. Bill Delahunt, a longtime critic of U.S. Cuba policy who now
lobbies for New Jersey-based Healiance Pharmaceutical.

Garcia said Delahunt, a Democrat, pitched him on the proposal as well as
Republican John Sununu, a former New Hampshire governor and later White
House chief of staff to President George H.W. Bush.

After Garcia met with the two last week, his office helped circulate
letters in Congress to gain support for testing and marketing of the
diabetic foot-ulcer treatment, Herberprot-B, in the United States.

Under U.S.-Cuba trade restrictions, an office of the U.S. Department of
the Treasury would have to license the foot-ulcer therapy in the United
States because it was developed by an arm of the Castro government,
Cuba’s Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology.

The trade restrictions are intended to keep Cuba from profiting from
access to U.S. markets without making democratic reforms on the island.

“The lack of access to an effective treatment for this life-threatening
condition, which afflicts millions of Americans and results in billions
of dollars of direct medical costs, is a serious unmet medical need for
the American people that should be viewed as a human issue and not as
part of a Cold War-era political one,” said a draft of a letter to be
sent to Treasury Secretary Jack Lew.

The letter says the therapy has been used in 16 countries to treat
100,000 people with high risk of amputation from diabetic foot ulcers.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Miami, cast doubt on the claims.

“The Castro regime does a lot of publicity for miracle cures that don’t
work and don’t help the Cuban people,” she said. “It certainly will be
helpful to the regime in terms of publicity.”

Ros-Lehtinen said she saw a copy of the letters — one to Lew, the other
to members of Congress — and she expressed concern that neither
mentioned Healiance or its parent company, Digen Pharmaceuticals, by
name. Delahunt did not return calls or an email for comment.

Ros-Lehtinen said this is the first time she can remember a
Cuban-American member of Congress “supporting something that will be
helpful to the regime.”

Congress has seven Cuban-American members. Garcia, who once headed the
hard-line Cuban American National Foundation, is the only one who
appears to support the move.

The effort is being run out of the office of Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif.
A handful of Democrats — some of them major critics of U.S. Latin
America policy — have signed on, including Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., who
joined Delahunt as a member of a U.S. delegation that attended the
funeral of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez in March.

The letter was shared with Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Weston, head
of the Democratic National Committee, but she declined to sign it, an
aide said.

Wasserman Schultz’s position is a sign of how “there was no daylight, no
distance between us when it came to Cuba in the South Florida
delegation,” said Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Miami.

“We’re dealing with a state sponsor of terrorism that, at this time, is
holding an American hostage,” Diaz-Balart said, referring to imprisoned
contractor Alan Gross. “This is a state sponsor of terror that was just
caught shipping arms to another state sponsor of terror, North Korea.
This is a state sponsor of terror that has an active espionage network.”

Diaz-Balart’s brother, Lincoln Diaz-Balart, twice fought similar efforts
to bring Cuban-U.S. pharmaceutical partnerships to the United States. At
least two were approved under President George W. Bush.

Garcia said a 2009 comment from Diaz-Balart’s chief of staff indicated
the former Republican congressman did not oppose the research, but
Diaz-Balart said the comment was misconstrued.

It has been tougher holding a hard line on Cuba in the era of President
Barack Obama, who loosened Cuba travel and remittance policies.

It did not appear to hurt Obama’s election chances, either, with Florida
exit polls indicating he either narrowly lost or even won Florida’s
Cuban-American vote, once a reliable Republican bloc.

The island’s current dictator, Raúl Castro, has loosened travel
restrictions, too. Coupled with generous U.S. policies for Cuban
immigrants, more have come to the United States in recent years.

The influx of new Cuban-American arrivals has led to some tensions
between those who identify themselves as political exiles and newcomers
who are more like economic immigrants.

The growing numbers of non-Cuban Hispanics are also changing the
complexion of South Florida and its politics.

Garcia’s congressional district, which stretches from suburban
Miami-Dade to Key West, is about 65 percent Hispanic and majority
Cuban-American. One of Garcia’s Republican opponents, Carlos Curbelo,
has made Cuba policy a key issue in the race.

“Let the people who want to talk politics go and talk politics,” Garcia
said. “This is about a treatment that’s designed to help Americans. And
these are just tests. If it’s a hoax, then someone’s out a lot of money.
But if the treatment works, why wouldn’t we do this?”

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